Consumer appetite for access to information continues to grow along with growth of the Internet. Corresponding to such growth, new information is added to the Internet constantly. With respect to multimedia content in particular, much of this information comes at a significant cost in bandwidth.
Telephone dial-up service is being replaced with broader bandwidth systems such as satellite, digital subscriber line (DSL), and cable modem. Unfortunately, these systems are not presently available to a significant portion of the population. Moreover, acquisition and installation costs associated with these systems make them less appealing.
Accordingly, wireless connectivity is on the rise. Wireless systems may be deployed more rapidly with less cost than their wired counterparts. Systems using cellular phone technologies are directed at providing mobile wireless Internet connectivity. Unfortunately, such systems are bandwidth limited.
Alternatives to cellular telephone technologies are cellular architectures providing high speed, data only services. An example is Multi-channel, Multi-point Distribution Service (MMDS) being provided by Sprint under the trade name Sprint Broadband Direct. Benefits of wireless systems for delivering high-speed services include rapid deployment without overhead associated with installation of local wired distribution networks. Unfortunately, MMDS relies upon long range transmissions and a sophisticated customer premise installation. Accordingly, Sprint has apparently determined that this approach is too expensive to be commercially viable.
What is needed is a fixed wireless solution with bandwidth comparable to DSL and cable modem technologies that is less complex to install and less costly. A mesh architecture and protocol serves these needs. In U.S. Pat. No. 5,682,382 to Shepard, a fixed wireless network is disclosed. In Shepard, the wireless network is based on a decentralized packet-radio concept using spread-spectrum technology for transmitting and receiving. However, Shepard is subject to limitations of spread spectrum technology.
Therefore, it would be desirable to provide a mesh network and node not dependent upon spread spectrum technology. More particularly, such a mesh system should be less difficult to install and deploy than MMDS system in order to be commercially viable.